The Lost Children
by vacant houses
Summary: Prototype 2 AU. New York Zero is on the verge of destruction. Sergeant James Heller is pulled from the Red Zone to take part in a last ditch Blackwatch experiment to turn the tide against the Infection. Nobody said gaining a creepy voice in his head was part of the deal.
1. Prologue

Disclaimer: Not mine

Continuity: Prototype AU. The nuke went off but Mercer doesn't fully recover from it.

My thanks to my beta, Tayta Malikai for all the late night discussions and brainstorming. Also. The title is due for a change but until something comes to me, it'll stay as is. I feel it summarises the fic nicely. Stuff. Happens. Lots of stuff.

* * *

**Prologue**

_Heat._

_He burns._

_Then- wet. It's wet. Wet ,wet, wet and he's just so tired._

_He's never slept before but his mind is slipping. Forgetting._

_Unravelling._

_Then- dry._

_Dry and warm, somehow he is pushed ashore. Caught in the crashing waves, he is trapped inside his own capsule of biomass, he is pushed this way and that by the water._

_There's no energy left in him now. He's lost so much of himself, forgot his own shape and he cannot escape. From his limited awareness, he feels something approach. Footsteps on the ground, vibrations transmitted through concrete. He twitches._

_Consume. Consumeconsumeconsume**CONSUME.**_

_But he's too weak to do anything._

_He slips and unravels._

_And discovers how to sleep._

* * *

X

"Doctor Koenig? We have a new project for you, something we think you'll find most interesting."

Doctor Anton Koenig coldly studied the Blackwatch colonel who'd invaded his lab without warning. He actually hadn't met the man in charge before; once allocated to the Manhattan situation, he'd buried himself in his work and not stopped since. There had been meetings, the doctor knew, meetings that he'd been invited to and soundly ignored, too busy with his research. And who could blame him, the properties of the Blacklight virus were simply astounding, the possibilities were endless.

Now, it seemed, his actions had come back to bite him in the ass. Koenig did not let this bother him too much; they had asked him here, after all. He was a valuable asset, one that Gentek could not afford to lose.

"What is it? I'm making remarkable progress on the project you brought me in for. Those brutes, the D-Codes? There is so much to be done to refine them and I simply do not have the time for every little-"

"Zeus."

One simple word, yet it shattered Koenig's world.

"What about Zeus?" he asked tightly, trying not to let it get to him. "Is he-is he coming here? Has my work been compromised? Colonel Rooks we must evacuate-"

"Doctor," the Blackwatch colonel broke in. "How willing would you be to work on him?"

"...on him? Colonel, you have my complete attention."

X X X

Zeus had survived Randall's final solution.

The information was classified beyond top secret and Koenig knew that neither the colonel nor his loyal side kick would hesitate to put a bullet through his head should he turn down the project. An insane thought, as if he'd pass up a chance to study Alex Mercer's infamous legacy. Zeus was nothing like they'd ever seen before, the likes of which had never been hinted before amongst all the viruses they'd extracted from Greene's comatose body.

If they could only duplicate the results in a controlled manner…

The task seemed daunting but unlike most scientists of his caliber and knowledge, Koenig remained unphased by the monumental task he was undertaking. If, in his final moments, Mercer could create a shape-shifting virus in the cramped and unhygienic conditions of a crowded train station, then Koenig was already at an advantage. Time and a laboratory with unlimited resources were on his side.

Then...then they brought Zeus in.

Koenig's hard earned confidence came crashing down.

He stared at the charred black lump that had been transported into his lab by a whole Blackwatch containment unit. This...this was supposed to be Zeus? A virologist's wet dream come to life, he held within his hands the remains of the world's first sentient virus and it was nothing like what he'd imagined. He swallowed once, thankful that his containment suit hid his nervousness. All eyes were on him for guidance but this...he was not prepared for this! Rooks had been so tightlipped about everything regarding Zeus but he had completely failed to mention that the recovered remains he was so proud of were burnt to crisp. How exactly was he supposed to work with this?

Mechanically, he reached across the lab bench for a glass rod. He refused to appear stumped before his colleagues. With the rod, Koenig cautiously began to poke the hard mass. He could almost feel the collective flinch that went through the room at his actions.

A thin smile curled his lips. Well, that was why they paid him the big bucks. He certainly wasn't afraid of a test subject in his lab and at his mercy. The black mass had the appearance of Zeus's fearsome armour, the thing must have tried to protect itself from the blast. Koenig wouldn't have believed it possible for anything to remain in the face of a nuke if the evidence was not sitting on his desk.

The first layers flaked off and crumbled under the glass rod. Then, he struck a hard solid layer that no amount of tapping could get past. The extreme heat must have fused the armor into an impenetrable layer. Koenig raised his head and glanced round at his assistants.

"Damian," he said calmly, "Get a tube and take this dust away for analysis. Janet, I want this thing scanned down to the very molecule, I want to know what exactly is inside it. Lieutenant Riley, do we have anything capable of cutting through Zeus's armor?"

The man tilted his head and studied the black lump in front of Koenig. Unlike the rest of his men, the lieutenant did not wear a mask and Koenig watched as a cruel smile spread across the soldier's face. "How about a chainsaw?"

Koenig smiled darkly. "That would be just perfect."

X X X

The scans had come back inconclusive: there was a layer of something under Zeus's thick skin, but they didn't know what. And the outer layers that crumbled under the lightest touch were useless for any genetic analysis. So they needed to get underneath the armor and find out if there was anything hidden away inside.

It had taken a special chainsaw, one optimized for cutting through concrete in fact, to slice through Zeus's hide. Rooks had approved the request with a certain amount of enthusiasm that characterized the inherent viciousness of Blackwatch. It was nice to believe that as the blade dug in, there was some awareness in Zeus left to feel the pain.

Koenig doubted that it was actually capable of such but still, the thought counted.

When they pulled the blade back, Koenig strode forward and examined the lump. There. Underneath Zeus's thick hide, red and black tentacles writhed. Koenig was quick to poke it with his rod; the tentacles came freely away, curling up around the rod. They were not attached at all to the layer of armor encapsulating them. The extreme heat had indeed fused the outer armor to the point that the rest of Zeus had separated from it, trapped and unable to get out. There was actually very little of the virus left, certainly not enough to force its way out of the charred lump.

Koenig looked up at his assistants. "Janet, get me a containment canister. Damian, some Bloodtox but dilute it down, a thousand times. Get Zeus into storage." He moved away from the bench as theories and experiments began to brew inside his head. Lieutenant Riley fell into step beside him as Koenig headed towards his office. "Well Lieutenant, it looks like pulling me away from the D-Codes isn't turning into a complete waste of time."

The soldier's sharp eyes studied Koenig carefully. "You seem awfully sure that you can do this," Riley observed.

Koenig glanced back at him. "You think I can't?" he demanded, offended.

"Make an injectable form of the Blacklight virus to give Blackwatch soldiers Zeus's powers?" the Blackwatch lieutenant scoffed. "Look out how the D-Codes turned out."

"It can be done."

"If you insist. Just don't disappoint Rooks." There was no mistaking the pointed warning in Riley's words and the dark glint in his eyes.

Of course. Koenig didn't understand the exact nature of the friendship the Colonel had with the lieutenant but he wasn't all that surprised that the man was taking this personally. As if this project didn't mean as much to Koenig as it did to Blackwatch. "I have no intention of failing, Lieutenant," Koenig said sharply. "I take pride in my work. Failure is unacceptable."

Riley snorted at that but made no comment. He glanced darkly back towards Koenig's lab, where the last pieces of Zeus remained. "Speaking of the D-Codes," Koenig suddenly came to a stop and turned to his unwanted companion. "There were many ideas I had for them, theories I didn't get to test out before you pulled me away from there."

"Oh?"

"I wrote up a brief for it, it's in my office. A new project, if Blackwatch and Rooks has the time for it. I call it Project Orion."

X X X

Koenig threw the lab test results at his bench as he paced around in a huff. There's no denying it, the remains of Zeus that Blackwatch had recovered were useless. Radiation had mutated the sequences severely, he wasn't sure of the extent of the changes but it had been significantly altered from those taken by Karen Parker. Of course, Zeus had also mutated by itself several times since then. It was difficult to tell what was simply natural progression by Zeus and what was radiation at work. But the fact that Zeus had not recovered, that it remained a black and red swirl in a glass canister in the cold room of Koenig's lab, spoke volumes.

Something was wrong with it. No one had the faintest inklings were the fault lay, there was so much they hadn't known about the Blacklight virus before and now Koenig feared its unique abilities had been lost forever.

Rooks would not be pleased. Galloway would not be pleased either. But there was nothing he could do about it. He turned and planted both hands on either side of the lone canister on the bench and glared at it. This was supposed to be it, Gentek's holy grail and Mercer's legacy. The solution to the Infection that had spun out of control in the recent months.

Perhaps he was looking at this the wrong way. His efforts of late had stalled over the damage to Zeus's genome, knowing that he could not restore the virus to its original glory. So instead of trying to fix Zeus, he should take a different approach. Work with what he had. At the very least, he could develop a system to safely introduce Blacklight into a human without killing it. After that, he could worry about whether the person was another Zeus or not. Once a system was established...they could look at Mercer's original work and try to recreate that instead of working with the end product.

Koenig's face tightened and he glared at the canister that sat on the bench before him. Red tendrils swirled lazily around, ignorant of his anger. Rooks would not be happy. He wanted to see results with Zeus itself and was convinced that the answer lay there. Koenig drummed his fingers impatiently against the bench's surface.

A combined approach, then. He'd find a way to introduce Zeus into a Blackwatch solider and be done with it. Koenig didn't doubt that there was no way to recreate Zeus's powers using the severely mutated sample, but it would technically fulfill what Rooks had asked from him. Then, the doctor could move on to more promising projects and actually accomplish his goals. A safe delivery system would be useful in future lines of research so it would not be a complete waste of time.

Now, to see if he could persuade Rooks to give him the test subjects he needed.

X X X

"I don't think you understand the scope that you're asking me for. Recreate Zeus but in a test-tube form to create a new generation of super-soldiers?"

"Is it too hard for you, doctor? They assured me you were at the top of the field."

"Top of my- this has nothing to do with it. You have given me substandard samples to work with!"

"We gave you Zeus."

"You gave me what was left of him." An incredulous laugh. "He was at ground zero of a nuclear blast. Do you know what it did to his DNA? It's damaged, hideously mutated."

A pause. "Unusable."

"Then make it work, Doctor."

"I don't think you're listening to me-"

"I don't think you've realized that you do not have a choice."

A nervous swallow. "I- I'll need test subjects. Medical records of all your men and more. I need a genetic profile that can work with Blacklight. Mercer was unique, a one in a million chance and finding another like him- I need as many records as you can find."

"Anything you need Doctor, all you have to do is ask."

X

Of course, it had to come all crashing down. Theory was always easier than the practical.

X

"I need results Keonig, not failure! Those were good men, good Blackwatch soldiers and you wasted them!"

"And I need men with the right genes! You pushed for the experiments to go ahead, you insisted that they should take place even though I said that they were a waste of time and would not work!"

"You are not trying hard enough!"

"You have not given me the resources I need! Blackwatch troops, Blackwatch profiles but you won't look anywhere further! And you need to look further! I told you, Mercer was one in a million and I have been over and over your records of Blackwatch, Blackwatch, Blackwatch and more Blackwatch and -I'm sorry- but that one is not IN Blackwatch."

"Are you seriously suggesting we use a non-Blackwatch troop for this experiment? We cannot risk a Z-Code soldier running amok. That is why we agreed that Blackwatch men would be the best for this."

"Well, then I'm very sorry to disappoint you Colonel but I've been over your damn records and there is NO ONE there. You might as well shelve the project and send me back to somewhere more useful."

A pause. Rook glared at Koenig from across his desk and the doctor barely dared to breath but really, it was not him with his back against the wall. Either option suited him but he was tired of pursuing useless lines of research when he lacked the resources he needed and there were other projects to be working on. The ball was in Rooks' court now.

The Colonel eventually straightened. "...Perhaps then we should try the marines."

X X X

LOADING MILITARY RECORD

JAMES HELLER: SERGEANT (123-65-1658)

LAST TOUR: IRAQ, 2009 - INTERRUPTED

AWARDED: PURPLE HEART, SILVER STAR, IRAQ CAMPAIGN

WIFE, COLETTE HELLER: DECEASED

DAUGHTER: AMAYA HELLER: DECEASED

KILLED BY CIVILIANS INFECTED WITH MERCER VIRUS

SERGEANT HAS REQUESTED POSTING TO RED ZONE

LOADING PSYCH REPORT...

PSYCH ASSESMENT:

POST TRAUMATIC STRESS DISORDER

NO REGARD FOR OWN SAFETY

**HOMICIDAL FIXATION ON ALEX MERCER**

RECOMMENDATION: **DENY POSTING.** PLACE ON INDEFINITE LEAVE

LOADING SITUATION REPORT…

35% INCREASE IN INFECTED POPULATION

52% INCREASE IN RED ZONE CASUALTIES

NYZ OPERATION: DETERIORATING

REASSESSING TROOP ASSIGNEMENTS…

JAMES HELLER, SERGEANT (123-651658)

STATUS: REINSTATED. ASSIGN TO RED ZONE

X X X

"Doctor Koenig, have you seen this?"

"What is it Damian?"

"That last batch of genomes we went through from the UMSC? We found a match."

"Let me see that…oh _my_. Get me Rooks."


	2. Rebirth

_"And I wanna go ride the roller coasters again."_

_"Alright sweetie, we'll take you to ride the roller coasters just as soon as my tour ends. But it's past your bedtime so say goodnight. Put mummy on okay?"_

_"Okay goodnight daddy. I love you."_

_"She's been talking about roller coasters non-stop since we got back."_

_"I wish I could have been there."_

_"Ah, yeah. Me too. I miss you Jimmy. We both too"_

_"Yeah, I miss you too baby."_

X

"UMSC officials have confirmed that there has been a surge in Blacklight infected individuals after a two month drop. The severe fall in numbers had led many to hope that the viral outbreak was almost contained and that the worst was over but now it appears that the virus is getting a second wind. As of today, an elite government military force known as Blackwatch has officially taken control of military operations in New York City."

X

_"I thought all that was over and done with but now they're saying this virus thing is cropping up again. Jimmy, I'm worried here."_

_"Baby, I need you to try and relax, alright? Now, I'm gonna be home in a couple of weeks and maybe we'll go stay with your mum while, just 'til they get things sorted out."_

X

"It's been three months since the last sighting of Alex Mercer. Blackwatch officials have confirmed that the bioterrorist was killed in an explosion several weeks after the outbreak and have been able to identify his remains."

X

_"Now everytime I look out the window, I see Blackwatch troops. Jimmy, they've closed Maya's school! I just- I don't know if we should be here. They-they said stay put and don't go causing any panic."_

_"Well then just stay put and don't go causing any panic, alright. I'll be there tomorrow tonight."_

_"But-"_

_"Collete, go take Maya and go see your mom. Okay baby, if they got the situation contained then there's no reason to doubt them, right?"_

X

"In addition to Manhattan Island, Blackwatch has declared martial law over Brooklyn and Staten Island. UMSC forces have been withdrawn completely from Brooklyn and are being deployed solely in Manhattan and Staten Island. All forms of communication have been cut from Manhattan and Brooklyn. Blackwatch officials have stated that the situation in both boroughs have deteriorated completely and have changed the deployment to see the difference in tactics will have an effect in containing the Blacklight virus."

X

_"I'm sorry I- I just-just feel so far away from you guys." _

_"I miss you daddy."_

_"I miss you too baby girl. But don't worry. Daddy's coming home."_

* * *

"Welcome to the Red Zone, Sergeant. Welcome to hell."

X

"Colonel Rooks? I believe we have a promising candidate for Project Dionysus..."

X

"Know your type, son. Lost someone important to you, friends, family, to the infected, so you came here to make every last one of these mother fuckers burn. Or you die trying in the process. They don't call us the suicide squads for nothing."

X

"Sir? Do we really want to use a marine for the Z-Code project?"

"Have a look at his record, Riley. Suicidal with a homicidal obsession on Alex Mercer. We couldn't ask for anyone better."

X

"Heller. Something strange has come up. Blackwatch has been asking for you, son. Now, I don't care if you die out on patrol or walk into Graham's line of fire or somethin. But Blackwatch? They're sick, they ain't right in the head. It'd be best if you stay as far as possible from them. I don't know what you've done to catch their attention but it won't end well, I can promise you that. No matter what they say, no matter what they offer you, say no. You join up with those baby killers; you're not signing away your life. You're signing away your soul."

X

"Sergeant Heller, we have a proposition for you. We believe you make the ideal candidate for a project of ours. A project called Dionysus..."

* * *

Whispers.

They were the first thing he heard when he awoke. Ghostly voices hissing in his ears, the words just a little too faint and jumbled to make out the words. It was odd but that was not the only thing that was weird.

His body felt off. His skin was crawling- no, writhing. Like he didn't have any bones and all his muscles are just rubbing together. It didn't hurt but it was fucking weird and nauseating.

_They are going to burn me._

A voice, male and guttural suddenly spoke. He flinched at the volume; it was too close, too near his...ears? Ears? Did he have any? It didn't feel like...he didn't feel like have anything resembling a face.

Or a body.

He was trapped. Oh god, maybe he was paralyzed. Was this what it felt like, deaf, blind and numb to the outside world? Trapped within a flesh prison that couldn't respond to his commands.

Shitshitshitshitshit. This wasn't the way he was going to go. They'd promised him, those Blackwatch bastards. Highest probability of success they'd seen. They were going to give him the tools to kill every one of those infected fuckers that had killed his baby girl and his wife.

_Calm down._ That same voice that he could still hear. But he shouldn't have been able to, he didn't have any ears. Unless...the voice was actually inside his head.

_I need to get moving. Why can't I move? _There was a sense of frustration from the voice and it was weird knowing that it didn't come from him.

The presence attention turned from him-them?- (and sweet Jesus, how the hell could he even tell) and focused on something else, like it was listening to something he couldn't hear. Then it came back, alarmed and worried.

_Got to get up._

What-?

_Got to get up! _the voice repeated loudly. _They think it failed. That the experiment failed. They're going to burn it all to ash unless I get up right now and show them that it worked._

Get up? He didn't even have a _body_. Or, at least once that made sense to him. _Irrelevant. A body's just a shape, just flesh. Just need to turn what I have into what I remember._

What he remembered? Dimly, a memory flickered of him standing in the mirror. Dark skin, dark eyes, a thickset body, bald head. Nothing happened and the voice's frustration grew. Then, he could feel movement underneath him. Hadn't he been lying on an operating table before this whole thing started?

_They're going to incinerate me! Change, dammit!_

He had no idea what the voice was on about but he was not ready to die like this. The experiment hadto work, there were no other options. _Fuck it, why won't I-_

The presence _moved_ inside him, twisting and turning bits of himself that he wasn't even aware of. It was like it had reached straight into his very own core and rearranged him on his most basic levels. Then...then-

Shit.

Fuck. What the fuck was-

His body _changed_. It was pulling apart and- and- slithering and stretching and contorting and it _hurt._ Every part was being pulled in every direction all at once and re-shaped and he didn't know what was happening, didn't know which way was up-down-who was he, what was his name? Hands, what were hands, fingers, palm, five digits, nails, bones? Who-what-why- were those teeth and -who was he anyway? A name, he had a name. Mer- no. No, that wasn't him at all. Suddenly, his head - he had a head? - snapped up and eyes he didn't even realize he had opened.

He was sitting up on an operating table, in a room he only vaguely remembered. The movement beneath him had stopped, the people pulling the table had stepped back and were watching him warily. A crowd of guns were pointed straight at him and for a moment he didn't understand, wasn't this what they had wanted. But when he glanced down, his body was still churning, ropes of red and black writhing as they twisted and knotted together to build legs and feet. His new mouth fell open in shock.

What in the fucking world…?

_Finally_, the voice said triumphantly. But it sounded exhausted, weak and its presence was fading fast. For one strange moment, he could feel this presence of _other_ right inside of him, moving through him at the very molecular level. It was terrifying, the sensation. Feeling like a stranger in his own body.

Then, it was gone, all of it was just gone. The voice was swallowed up by a deep dark hole. If it had felt like the presence had been clutching at his very core before, pulling all his strings, now there was only a void. His mind was silent and his body had stopped changing. Everything was still.

"Congratulations, subject Heller," one of the Blackwatch scientists said. "It looks like you pass."

X

_He awakes and he is trapped._

_Something is wrong, everything is wrong._

_He doesn't have ears but he can hear them talking. Sounds like Blackwatch or Gentek. Scientists talking about a project…talking about him?_

_He can't tell._

_It's so hard to concentrate. Something is wrong._

_But he does know when they decide to burn him._

_He tries to get up. Tries to change and defend himself._

_It takes everything he has to heal himself._

_Alex falls._

_He doesn't stop._

_The voices of the condemned scream endlessly as he joins them._

_He unravels and forgets._

X

Heller. His name was James Heller.

He told them that.

"Date of birth?"

He told them that too.

"Do you remember what happened to you?"

Did he remember? He couldn't forget.

"I was serving abroad and there was a viral outbreak in Manhattan. Some fucking terrorist, Alex Mercer, released a lethal virus that infected the population, drove them crazy. Turned them into zombies or some shit. They killed my wife and daughter," and all he could feel was a dull ache at this admission and a slow burning, simmering rage at the man responsible. "I was brought in to be stationed in the Red Zone, suicide watch or whatever the fuck you call it. Then you guys got a hand on my medical records and offered me a place in your beyond top-secret super solider program. Said you could create one-man armies if you had the right genetic profile and that I fit the bill. Best candidate you had. And I said yes and now here we are."

The Blackwatch scientist - Doctor Koenig or whatever the fuck his name was- looked distinctly pleased. Heller was seated in a cell by himself being interviewed by the lab coat from across the glass. The doctor was surrounded by those D-Code super soldiers of Blackwatch and they were keeping a close watch on him, their guns pointed straight at hm. There were little pores in the walls, floor and ceiling that he hadn't quite figured out what they were for.

"How much do you remember about your childhood?"

Heller stared back at the man nonplussed. "What sort of dumb as fuck question is that?"

"Answer the question." It could have been his imagination but the D-Codes might have started to clutch the triggers of their weapons tighter.

"It's vague," Heller replied sharply. "Do you remember everything about your childhood?"

The Blackwatch scientist sighed. "Where did you grow up? The schools you attended, who were your friends. The subjects you took, the sports that you played, places you went to on vacation."

He frowned at the man but then shrugged and obligingly answered the questions to the best of his ability. Koenig listened patiently as his assistant furiously typed notes while Heller reminisced. At times, the doctor consulted a plastic folder on the desk in front of him.

"That matches what we have on file," Koenig said at last, then he leant forward and stared intently at Heller. "How do you feel?"

Heller thought about this question for a while. There were no tendrils anymore, none of the red and black so eerily reminiscent of the Infected. But he couldn't forget it; he didn't know what the experiment had done, but he wasn't sure that this was supposed to be it. The scientists had been cagey about what would happen to him, they'd talked more about his genetic profile and the probabilities of success. The only thing they could assure him of was that he'd be able to handle anything the Infected threw at him, and they'd already seen it in action. Just duplicating the results was the difficult part.

At the time he hadn't cared. He'd been ready for death, ready to do what it took to deal the most damage to the Infected. He'd signed the non-disclosure statements, agreed to all of Blackwatch's beyond top-secret disclaimers and given himself up to them to do what they pleased. He hadn't cared what they did to him so long as they gave him the tools to kill as many Infected as possible.

Now however, after waking up and fearing that he was trapped and paralyzed, he found that he wasn't ready for death just quite yet. It had been a wake-up, a reminder that there was still so much he could do. But as to what they'd done to him...whatever it was, there was no going back.

Time would tell if he'd come to regret it.

"I feel tired," he said flatly. "I'm pretty sure I was a lump of flesh on an operating theater a couple of hours ago, I've had chunks of me cut off to be taken away for further experiments. And then, while I was watching, those chunks of flesh just grew back. Like the way my legs just decided to when I first woke up. Is this what the project was trying to do?"

He could see just how useful accelerated healing would be on the battlefield. But what was the extent of the changes that they had made to him? Was this it?  
"This is part of what we were trying to accomplish," Koenig shuffled his notes and then reached for a remote. He pressed down on a button and activated a wall mounted screen. He then clicked something on his computer and a paused video appeared on the screen. "How much do you know about Alex Mercer, aka code name Zeus?"

Heller tensed at the name, anger building at the man responsible for this entire disaster.

"He's a monster and the leader of a terrorist cell," Heller responded flatly. "All of them dress the same to fool people into thinking there's the only the one guy. There's a lot of crazy stuff said about him on the streets, things like how he can fly, that there's only one of him. That he can kill people with his bare hands and steal their lives, that he can literally become another person. But he's the one who caused all of this."

"All of it true, I'm afraid," Koenig deadpanned.

"Bullshit," he said flatly, military decorum be dammed. He's seen a lot of shit out in the Red Zone, seen the Infected tear apart civilians and Marines alike. But shape-shifting and flying was something he wasn't willing to entertain because then they're all kinds of fucked.

Koenig shrugged. "What you see here is all unaltered Blackwatch footage. This is very real, subject Heller."

He clicked on his computer and the video started. It was of a Blackwatch patrol moving through the streets of Manhattan. Then, something off screen caught the attention of the squad. The camera tilted up to catch sight of a fast moving object launching itself off the building, straight into the patrol and leaving a crater in its wake. When the dust cleared, there was a man standing there and Heller couldn't mistake the outline of Alex Mercer. The image had been branded into his mind since learning of Amaya and Colette's death. The man tore into the soldiers in the video, his hands transforming into deadly claws with a wreath of black and red tendrils.

The video stopped. Sweet Jesus, was Mercer infected? Some special one-of-a-kind variant that he'd never seen before. _Shit. _Blackwatch had told him they'd seen the results but had never managed to duplicate it again.

Heller stared down at his hands, deceptively human looking but suddenly completely alien to him. Infected. He was infected.

What the fuck had they done…?

Before he even knew it, he was on his feet and then throwing himself at the wall. "What have you done to me?" he roared. His hands writhed and gradually lost their shape, fucking tendrils instead took their place.

The doctor backed away in alarm as the soldier took aim at Heller. "Whoa, hold on there, just a second," Koenig cautioned. "Calm down, Heller, this is what we wanted."

"You turned me into something like Alex fucking Mercer!" Heller gestured sharply to the creepy as fuck tentacles, then slammed an elbow into the clear wall separating him from Blackwatch. "How the hell is this okay?"

"We gave you everything you wanted," the doctor protested. "A way to make every single one of those infected fuckers dead, that's what you said! And now you have it. Mercer was near unstoppable, that is what we have done to you. We have made you invincible. A super soldier, more powerful than anything we've ever even seen-"

Heller turned and drove a tentacled fist into the wall and was rewarded with a sharp crack. He froze, staring incredulously at the cracks beneath his misshapen limb. "What the-" unconsciously, his fingers roughly regained their shape as he traced the broken edges left in the glass.

Distantly, he was aware of Koenig yelping, "Don't shoot! Don't shoot, lower your weapons. Do not agitate the subject!" and a Blackwatch soldier responded with, "Fuck your orders, Doctor! The subject already is agitated!"

"This is my project, Lieutenant. I'm the one in charge here and I say, stand down!"

Heller curled his deformed fingers and punched the wall one last time. It shattered under his fist as he watched, the sound filling his ears with ringing. As the soldier surrounding him backed up, Heller crouched down and picked up a shard from the floor.

"This situation is out of control-"

"If you'd just be patient, Lieutenant, we can still salvage this but not if you jump the gun-"

"Okay," Heller said, as he studied the broken debris in his hand. He didn't know what it was made from, super tough bulletproof glass, or something similar but he did know was that it was never meant to be shattered by a human hand. Just what was this new body capable of? Could he tear through the infected the way Mercer had easily sliced through trained Blackwatch soldiers? "I'll do it."

"-everything will be fine- what did the subject say?

Heller let the shard drop from his hand and straightened up. "I said, I'll do it. I'll be your super soldier, volunteered for this shit, didn't I? Might as well see this thing through."

X

RECORDED TRANSCRIPT FROM PROJECT DIONYSUS.

BRIEFING Z-CODE 01 BY LIEUTENANT CLINT RILEY

"Subject Heller, I'm going to brief you on Alex Mercer and the actual situation here on Manhattan. Mercer infiltrated Gentek, the public side of Blackwatch, as a geneticist. The terrorist cell he belongs to has not yet been identified though we have uncovered messages between him and his handlers. Gentek was attempting to engineer a super soldier serum called Blacklight as a means of reducing causalities for the United State army. Mercer was working on the serum but he sabotaged the project, using it to build a bioweapon. He took the only uncorrupted sample of Blacklight and used it on himself, then released the bioweapon in Penn Station.

That was the initial outbreak. I don't need to tell you what Blacklight did, you saw it every day you were posted to the Red Zone. Blackwatch and UMSC forces were brought in to contain the outbreak but Mercer, or Zeus as we call him, tore through our forces and allowed the infection to spread. He is completely responsible for the situation here and up until now, we haven't had anything that could match him.

That's where you come in. We'd been working on recreating the original Blacklight since the beginning of the outbreak, to even the playing field for our side. But Zeus had been thorough, he wiped out all our records of the serum and we only had limited success. I don't know all the science behind it, but the researchers somehow figured out that certain genes suited Blacklight better and that's how we found you.

Now, according to our intelligence, Zeus has been killed, an explosion took him out. But the outbreak hasn't stopped since his death, if anything three months after his death, it's started gaining momentum. Subject Heller, you are the first of a new force designed to contain the infection. A Z-Code super soldier."

X

DOCTOR ANTON KOENIG'S PERSONAL NOTES ON Z-CODE 01

Project Dionysus is a failure.

Oh, sure, the subject demonstrated properties similar to Zeus, a fact that pleases Rooks and his cohorts greatly. He appears to be capable of shape-shifting, possesses inhuman strength and rapid regeneration, at the very least. But the resemblance is superficial.

Zeus was a viral construct, made from Blacklight itself. It was human only on the exterior but on the inside, it was malleable viral matter. The subject, however, remains mostly human. Our tests so far have been able to confirm this. X-rays reveal bones and internal organs, most of his major body systems remain intact.

The question then becomes what are we dealing with? Our preliminary analysis of the subject's genome reveals that Zeus's genome has actually become incorporated into the subject's. This runs counter to everything we understood about Zeus, which was capable of consuming other organisms into itself and repurposing both flesh and genetic material. This cannot be stressed enough. Lieutenant Riley, whose understanding of biochemistry and genetics rivals that of a stone, has made several complaints to Colonel Rooks about the possibility that the project had resurrected Zeus. From the genetic data alone, this theory can be discarded and thankfully Rooks understands this. The subject has undergone severe mutation but remains, on a fundamental level, human. A fusion between virus and man, perhaps is the best description

How then, does the subject transform? Our current theory is that the subject completely radicalizes the gene expression within target cells, inducing a rapid metamorphosis. The subject's shape-shifting is notably slower and cruder than Zeus's and expends a huge amount of energy to achieve this. The subject's dietary requirements have substantially increased to accommodate for the sheer increase in raw material and energy. In a combat situation however, it is highly unlikely that the subject will be able to change as constantly as Zeus was able to, the subject will have to limit the number of transformations to maximize the usage of this ability.

It has also been hypothesized that Zeus's consumption ability has either been lost or completely mutated. Zeus injected Blacklight into his victims, infecting them and thus allowing it to absorb them into itself. As the subject is human based, it remains to be seen if he can demonstrate such viral properties.

Whilst exploring the extent of the subject's capabilities seems like a fascinating area of research, it is not a project that requires my full attention or supervision. I have no interest in being saddled with a failed experiment. Project Orion has several lines of promising research that I would like to pursue, if Rooks would only give me permission to leave this one. Galloway has been unable to change his mind on this matter and so I'm stuck here, with an increasingly hostile test subject and the difficult Lieutenant assigned to him. Rooks seems confident that the subject can be controlled by encouraging and enforcing his hateful fixation on Zeus and the Infection combined with a large amount of misinformation. I'm afraid that it will take very little for things to fall through with the subject, he seems to have little awareness and reverence for what we have managed to achieve for him. If I have one regret, it is that I fought Rooks over the usage of non-Blackwatch personnel. There's one thing that can be said about Blackwatch, their grunts are mindlessly loyal and fanatically dedicated to their cause.

The subject is not like that. We must tread carefully to ensure that the subject does not turn on us.

…

…

…

PS. The subject is a jerk. And he broke my favorite test tube, along with a lot of important laboratory equipment in that last test. And his cell. This is the fifth cell we've had to replace.

X

Lieutenant Clint Riley was studying his charge over the cameras installed in his cell when Rooks came in. "I don't like this, sir," he announced without hesitation.

"You're the best man for this job," the colonel replied steadily. "The only one I trust with this responsibility."

"Seen the way Koenig moons over his test subject? It's pretty sick," Riley muttered in disgust.

"What did you expect?" Rooks snorted disdainfully. "Gentek's white coats live for this shit."

Riley made a noise in agreement. He then turned his attention back to the camera and focused on the test subject. Rooks studied his subordinate and longtime confidante closely. "The subject bothers you?" he observed neutrally.

Riley placed both hands on the console in front of him and rested his weight there. "I just think we'll have a hell of a job trying to contain it if it puts its mind to escaping. It's the closest thing we have to Zeus. General Randall never even came close to stopping it."

Rooks joined him on the cameras, watching as the doctor tried to engage in conversation with the Z-Code. Koenig was attempting to take blood samples but the subject growled at him every time he got close to him with a needle. "Koenig says he still is a man and a man can be killed. He integrated the virus; the virus did not integrate him. If he turns out to be a threat, you'll take him down."

Riley scoffed quietly, shaking his head. "You know, the first thing Koenig did was show the subject just what Mercer was capable of. Gave it an idea of how fucked we are if it decided to turn on us." It would be a disaster, one purely of Blackwatch's making and even with all the safe-guards they had taken, Riley did not feel assured that it was enough.

"It won't come to that," Rooks spoke confidently. "The infected killed his family. He lives now only because he wants to see them dead. We both saw his psych profile. He may not be Blackwatch but he is still ideal for this project."

"Doesn't change the fact that Koenig is a menace, sir." The Lieutenant looked only half-heartedly convinced by his commander's attempts to reassure him.

"Come on, Riley. Eight D-Codes assigned to your personal command. And, once Project Orion gets up and running, you'll get upgraded with their finest anti-Z-Code troops. Command's been more than generous to you."

Riley looked up at that in surprise. "Koenig's proposals actually got through?" Whilst the Lieutenant wasn't interested in Gentek research, if he was going to be forced to work with Koenig, it'd probably be best if he knew what the man was up to. Rooks, on the other hand, actually understood Koenig's research and read his experimental reports, the high level genetics and virology shit that got the white coats all excited.

"They did. Say what you want about Koenig, the coat knows his stuff. The Orion Project will draw strictly from Blackwatch ranks. We won't have to worry about conflicts of interest."

If Rooks thought that Project Orion would be enough to handle the subject...Riley gave the cameras one last glance, then calmly switched them off.

"Oh, and Riley?"

"Sir?"

Rooks smiled warmly. "Worst comes to worst, make sure you burn him."

The Lieutenant answered that with a sharp grin. "With pleasure, sir," he promised as he followed his commander out of the room. It was in companionable silence that they made their way down the hallway until Rooks paused mid-stride.

"All records of Colette and Amaya Heller have been purged, haven't they?"

It took Riley less than a second to recall the information as he'd personally overseen that particular detail of this operation. "All databases except from the on-site Alpha level database and the off-site backup have been scrubbed of those records."

"Have them purged too. According to official records, they died in an infected attack, let there be nothing left to say otherwise."


End file.
